


Something Lost & Something Gained

by kaibasetos



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh!
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-12
Updated: 2015-01-12
Packaged: 2018-03-07 07:07:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3165887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaibasetos/pseuds/kaibasetos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Start by pulling him out of the fire and hoping that he will forget the smell.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Something Lost & Something Gained

**Author's Note:**

> The summary, opening and closing lines of this fic were taken from the poem ["Start Here"](http://alonesomes.tumblr.com/post/78510570406/start-by-pulling-him-out-of-the-fire-and-hoping) by Caitlyn Siehl. Enjoy!

When is a monster not a monster?

There is a certain point after everything is said and done when Jounouchi realizes he no longer sees a monument of cold, calculated callousness when he looks at Kaiba. He sees the veneer Kaiba presents, the pristine outer shell of a sneering upper-class prick who needs no one, but he sees beneath that as well. He sees the vulnerability and the weakness and the way both of those things make Kaiba’s blood run hot with rage and fear. He sees the way an instant of perceived fragility makes Kaiba’s muscles tense up, as though he simply cannot allow an image of himself other than the one he has so carefully crafted to exist. He sees layer upon layer of Kaiba’s bitterness, his wrath, his hunger for power and prestige, all folding in upon one another to create the squared shoulders and upturned nose of a boy who has resolved to forge his own destiny and to never look back at the past that has served him so wrongly.

He sees everything, and he hopes to hell and back that Kaiba can’t tell that he does.

“What  _are_ you looking at, Jounouchi?”

Kaiba’s voice has a bite to it that rouses Jounouchi from his thoughts with force. They are sitting together in Kaiba’s office, illuminated only by the blue cast that Kaiba’s laptop casts upon the room and the serene, twinkling lights of Domino through the window. Jounouchi has been waiting on Kaiba to finish his work so they can head back to Kaiba’s mansion for what feels like an eternity, and in his boredom it seems he’s been staring… Well, directly at Kaiba. He allows his gaze to linger on Kaiba’s solemn, unreadable face for a moment longer before he averts his eyes, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand.

“Guess I musta just zoned out,” he says without a hint of apology, and Kaiba makes a quiet  _hmph_ noise in the back of his throat, almost drowned out by the sound of his quick typing.

“Your staring is very distracting. Don’t do it again.”

Jounouchi makes a rude face in response and mocks Kaiba under his breath, knowing that Kaiba is too deep in whatever he’s been poring over for the past hour to notice. Then again, that’s the issue. It’s been difficult growing closer to Kaiba when all he seems to do is work, work himself weary, work himself to the bone. Even in the dull electronic lighting Jounouchi can see the dark circles under his eyes, and they seem to grow darker by the day. He can’t remember the last time he saw Kaiba at rest, the last time he saw him without tension in his spine and stiffness in his jaw.

He may not be willing to admit it to himself fully just yet, but he can't help but worry.

As Kaiba sinks once again into the depths of his number crunching, Jounouchi stretches out on the couch, allowing his eyes to wander over the nearly barren office. There’s a glaring absence of the items that would typically decorate an office; no pictures, no nostalgic objects, nothing. A further extension of Kaiba’s decision to distance himself, to maintain his status as someone who refuses to be shaken by emotion. It seems unbearably stifling to someone like Jounouchi, with sentimentality and warmth welling in his chest. He can’t imagine having a space he didn’t make his own, didn’t spruce up with reminders of Shizuka, Yuugi, Anzu, Honda -- all of them.

He’s stricken with the thought that Kaiba has never really had an excuse to do such a thing.

Restless energy wired through him, Jounouchi shifts and stretches again, this time crossing his legs underneath him and sitting up a little higher. He catches Kaiba’s eye when Kaiba glances over in irritation at the squeaking of the couch interrupting his train of thought, but he just shrugs.

The near-silence between them stretches on into the night, and all of it is filled with Jounouchi’s musing.

It’s probably a bad idea, but Jounouchi, of course, says it anyway.

“Hey, Kaiba.”

Kaiba glances up from his work again with a sound of annoyance, but just for the moment, he actually stops typing. Jounouchi looks up to the ceiling.

“Do you ever think about your past?”

His eyes are pulled back to Kaiba with the sharp intake of breath his question is followed by. Kaiba is stiff, his detached expression a little uneasy -- Jounouchi can see it in the downward slant of his lips, the unpleasant cast in his eyes -- but it only stays that way for an instant before it’s wiped clean and replaced with a look of determination, something that can't be argued with.

“I don’t,” Kaiba says, and his voice is level but the undertone is firm and venomous:  _drop it_.

He immediately returns to his typing and Jounouchi leans forward, elbow on his leg and chin propped in his hand.

“Yeah, but why not? It’s kinda important, don’t ya think?”

Kaiba sighs, a sound that is so much larger and older than himself, and drops his hands to his desk as he glares at Jounouchi over his laptop. It may not be the best conversational topic, but it’s one that’s gotten Kaiba to look at Jounouchi properly for the first time since he got here, so that’s got to be a victory, right?

“I have no need for purposeless ruminations about my past. It means nothing to me. My future is vastly more important. I'd like to continue working if you’re done asking me such pointless questions.” Every syllable of Kaiba’s clipped words absolutely radiates with intensity, with resentment, and for a moment Jounouchi has to marvel at how dedicated he sounds. He really believes this, believes that leaving the past behind is the most logical course of action, and while it’s an admirable idea something about that still doesn’t sit right with Jounouchi.

He wouldn’t be who he is right now without his past and the lessons and consequences it has taught him, after all. His thoughts drift to Yuugi, to the time before Yuugi came into his life, to how  _wrong_  he used to be about everything.

“Your past is a big deal, though. I mean, like, lookin’ back it really influences who you become and it has a lotta stuff to teach ya if you just--”

“My past has  _nothing_  to teach me,” Kaiba interrupts nastily, and his words are suddenly so full of malice they actually take Jounouchi aback. “I am who I am today not because of my past, but because of the choices I have made of my own will. That’s the fact of the matter. This isn’t something I’m willing to discuss with you, Jounouchi.”

The look on his face is one that screams to just let it fucking go, and Jounouchi can see the smallest crack forming in that perfect veneer of his. A crack that peers into Kaiba’s insecurities, lying dormant beneath his mental armor; a crack that Kaiba is trying so desperately to hide with stinging aggression and stubborn pride. Jounouchi has already seen it, though, and the tired, fearful little boy that lies beyond it.

Kaiba tries so hard to force everyone out, and Jounouchi wishes that just once, he would be allowed in.

“Look, I’m sorry, alright,” Jounouchi almost mumbles, holding up his hands in surrender, but the sour look Kaiba is wearing doesn’t fade in the slightest. “I just thought maybe you’d wanna talk about it since ya never do.”

“Did you ever consider that perhaps there’s a reason for that?” Kaiba’s face twists into a scowl as he speaks, his fingers curling with barely contained anger. “Did you ever consider that perhaps I don’t want people prying into my private business?”

Jounouchi starts to argue but he can feel something sore and hurt stirring underneath every forced breath Kaiba utters, something horrible, something dead and left to rot. He understands, now, why Kaiba won’t talk about it. He’s not sure what’s caused it -- perhaps this was just a particularly awful time to bring it up, perhaps all the pressure Kaiba is under is getting to him -- but that crack in Kaiba’s veneer is widening. Again Jounouchi can see the weakness winding between all those carefully constructed pillars of strength, like ivy climbing castle walls. Kaiba is all tension and pain, his face half animosity and half exhaustion, inner demons crawling and brawling within him, and all at once Jounouchi yearns to be the one to destroy all the things that have made him this way.

He wants to kill everything that has ever killed a piece of Kaiba Seto.

“I’m sorry, Kaiba,” Jounouchi repeats, and he unfolds himself from the couch to stand and walk around the desk, ignoring the way Kaiba’s body goes suddenly rigid. He reaches out to touch Kaiba’s arm and Kaiba jerks back as though burned, looking like he’s simultaneously both ready to flee and ready to fight, apprehensive and bristling.

“Don’t.”

“Kaiba--”

“ _Don’t._ ”

Kaiba is looking away from him now but for the rarest few seconds Jounouchi can see everything laid bare before him in the strain of Kaiba’s throat and the slightest quiver of his hands. All of the innerworkings Kaiba tries so relentlessly to conceal, all of the doubt, all of the wounds, all of the agony. Jounouchi’s heart wrenches in his chest for this boy who had his childhood wrestled right out from under him, this boy trying so hard to play the part of a man. This boy who hates so much he won’t allow anything close enough to love him.

Kaiba is a mess, but damn if he isn’t Jounouchi’s mess, and even if Jounouchi can’t do anything to help him he’s never let anything stop him from trying.

“Kaiba,” Jounouchi implores, softer, and this time when he lays his hand on Kaiba’s arm Kaiba only flinches. “I shouldn’t have brought it up. You don’t need to talk about it. Just -- just be here with me, alright?”

Kaiba takes a long breath that sounds as though it’s causing him physical pain, painstakingly gathering himself up before he finally turns to face Jounouchi. His expression is once again meticulously composed and incomprehensible, but there’s a phantom of torment just behind his eyes, far away but enough to make him look so fucking exposed Jounouchi feels as though he’s seeing something he shouldn’t.

Jounouchi is tidal waves crashing, he’s the echoes of gunshots in the depths of war, and he’s consumed by the need to protect, to defend, to fight. Something physical he’d happily annihilate with his own two hands, but something intangible like this he has no way to defeat, and it makes him wild. It eats him up.

He’d lay waste to cities and level mountain ranges if it meant never having to see that grief in Kaiba’s face again.

“Stop looking at me like that,” Kaiba says. That steely note is back in his voice again, but Jounouchi has never been so happy to hear it, nor so happy to see the scrutinous look Kaiba is giving him. It makes him feel lighter, somehow.

“Like what?” Jounouchi asks, a little bit of a grin forming at the edges of his mouth.

Kaiba seems to think about it for a moment, cautiously choosing his words.

“Like something cherished,” Kaiba replies slowly, as though he’s still not quite sure of what’s coming out of his mouth, and Jounouchi tries his best to pretend that statement doesn’t breathe fire through his veins.

“Don’t know what you’re talkin’ about,” he responds nonchalantly, but as his hand trails down to cover and hold Kaiba’s he can see the faintest trace of understanding settling into Kaiba’s face. The faintest trace of understanding, and the faintest trace of gratitude.

When is a monster not a monster?

Oh, when you love it.

**Author's Note:**

> Really late addition: Upon request, there is now a sequel to this fic over this way: http://archiveofourown.org/works/3405119


End file.
